Astrum Space plans to go public through a special purpose acquisition company (SPAC) merger to fund the company’s plans for a “satellite-to-device” (S2D) broadcast network for the Asia-Pacific region. The SPAC deal with blank check company Black Spade Acquisition III Co announced Thursday values Astrum Space at $1 billion.
The SPAC holds $172.5 million of cash in trust according to the Aug. 27 announcement. In a SPAC merger, SPAC shareholders are given the option to pull out shares before the business combination. The companies said that if no shareholders redeem their shares, Astrum’s existing shareholders will hold over 80% of the combined company after the merger. The deal is expected to close by the end of this year.
Last year, Astrum Space ordered a Geostationary Orbit (GEO) platform from Swissto12 for its Neastar-1 satellite. Neastar-1 will be an L-band satellite in the 105 degrees East position over the Asia-Pacific region designed to deliver a wholesale satellite-to-device broadcast and data-distribution network. The company has 25 MHz of contiguous L-band spectrum at 1467–1492 MHz.
Neastar-1 is expected for a planned late-2028 to first-quarter-2029 launch. Astrum has also secured orbital transportation service to GEO from Impulse Space.
The company describes its business plan as a wholesale model for mobile network operators, broadcasters, governments and enterprise customers, “positioning its GEO platform as a complementary one-to-many broadcast layer for terrestrial mobile networks.”
Astrum Space President and CEO Michael Do said this deal will help the company execute its commercialization strategy and expand commercial partnerships.
“Astrum has reached an important inflection point,” Do commented. “We have assembled the spectrum, orbital resources and satellite infrastructure to develop a differentiated S2D broadcast platform across Asia-Pacific. With our NEASTAR-1 satellite under development and launch and orbital-delivery services secured from Impulse Space, we believe we have a clear path toward deployment of our next-generation Geostationary platform.”
Astrum is headquartered in Singapore with operations in the Philippines, a satellite operations center in Virginia in the U.S., and a ground station in Brisbane, Australia. The company plans to be listed on the New York Stock Exchange.
